Insurance Rental Properties

Insurance rental properties

If you’re a landlord renting out property, you probably know that life can at times be a little stressful. These stresses can include the “what if” worries that inevitably go with owning any property particularly if you rent it out. One way you may be able to reduce at least some of these concerns is to ensure that you have good insurance rental properties in place.

Insurance rental properties is something that needs a little thought before rushing out to buy. That’s because the position of a landlord is different to that of a normal owner occupier and your insurance requirements will therefore not be the same.

This leads to point number 1 don’t think that you will be able to obtain adequate insurance cover through a buildings and contents policy designed for the owner occupier. If you have one in place already and are planning to now let the property out, it may be highly advisable to think about replacing it.

The reason for that is simple. Standard property insurance policies will automatically become invalid the moment a property is rented out. If you purchase owner occupier insurance and falsely declare that you, the owner, occupy it, your insurance is similarly invalid. If you claim under that insurance and falsely declare that you live in the property, you could be liable to prosecution and the insurance companies do have methods they use to find these things out.

So for the sake of saving yourself a few pounds in premiums, you may wonder whether or not the risk of trying to use standard home insurance instead of specialised policy covering insurance rental properties is worth it.

If you accept the logic that you need some form of professional landlord’s insurance, the next point relates to your risks.

You are probably aware of the risks that nature can pose to your property such as storms and floods etc. It is of course critically important that insurance rental properties cover those risks. What is not always immediately apparent, particularly to the newer landlord, is that as your activity is commercial you are vulnerable to additional risks.

These include things such as:

• Your tenants they may damage your property, contents, fixtures and fittings accidentally, through vandalism or through a lack of care and attention. Your holding deposit cannot be presumed to cover such eventualities and it may not be high enough to cover the costs anyway;
• Your tenants can also run up significant rent arrears then vanish leaving you seriously out of pocket;
• The public and your tenants. It’s worth keeping in mind that if your tenants, their visitors or just members of the public passing by, are injured in connection with your property (e.g. protruding nails) you could face hefty claims and court awards against you for damages;
• Empty property. If your property sits empty between rentals or is empty while you’re re-decorating, this can make some insurance companies nervous. Empty properties are usually at a much higher risk of various forms of damage or intrusion than premises that are occupied.

These are all things that a good policy providing insurance rental properties should cover. There are specialist providers of this type of insurance that work over the Internet. Their sites may well be worth looking at if you would like to be a little more comfortable that your risks are under cover and sleep a little more easily at night!